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Title: A Life of One's Own
Subtitle: Individual Rights and the Welfare State
Author: David Kelley
Narrator: Scott R. Smith
Format: Unabridged
Length: 5 hrs and 57 mins
Language: English
Release date: 11-09-17
Publisher: The Atlas Society
Genres: Nonfiction, Social Sciences
Publisher's Summary:
The welfare state rests on the assumption that people have rights to food, shelter, health care, retirement income, and other goods provided by the government.
David Kelley examines the historical origins of that assumption, and the rationale used to support it today.
Members Reviews:
Probing Analysis of the Moral Justifications for the Welfare State
This is probably the best and most detailed analysis of the moral justifications for the welfare state. Exactly what one would expect from Dr. Kelley, one of todayâs leading philosophers. I particularly enjoyed the history of private philanthropy. Kelley shows that the welfare state was not a response to inadequacies of private philanthropy, but derives from the idea that people had right to be free from the restraints of reality. According to this idea, people should not be constrained by the fact that they have to earn a living or die, or that they get sick or injured, or that they grow old, or that they have to create shelter to live in. An excellent book and a must read for anyone interested in the philosophical underpinnings of the welfare state.
BTW: I find it interesting that Dr. Kelley appears to weigh in on the debate about self-ownership or self-sovereignty inadvertently. A number of times in the book he uses these and similar phrases and even quotes Lockeâs idea that we have a property right in ourselves. This issue is an ongoing debate that appears to have been created by Leonard Peikoffâs attack on the idea of self-ownership. Dr. Peikoffâs attack is inconsistent with Randâs own words on point.
Intellectual Thrill Ride
If you accept altruism in any of its forms, then you will probably have a difficult time with this book.
Your difficulty will be through no fault of the author but more the demands placed on the reader to follow, consider and finally to challenge deeply held premises presented in an objective and painstakingly researched style.
If you do not accept altruism, the above also applies except that you will have a much easier time of it.
Rational morality is designed to work because it derives from the nature of man as an autonomous, independent and rational being. It is true, it is elegant and it works. Turn it upside-down and you get a very different result. The book is thoroughly documented with examples of this upside-down, coercive "morality" taken both historically and from modern life. Kelly also does a superb job of showing historically how and why it was so seductive in this country to go from voluntary aid to coerced "benevolence" and the steps it took both intellectually and politically.
Though the book is dealing with a complex subject, you may be certain that if this subject interests you in the least the result is an intellectual thrill ride.
Of all the non-fiction books I have ever read, this one is in my Top Ten. And it is hard to know me without being asked to read it.
it's my life!
Great book! A moral and philosophical defense of personal responsibility!
Shows Why the Welfare State is Without a Rational Basis
As a former liberal, I found Kelley's arguments especially compelling. When I departed liberalism, I recognized that there was something profoundly wrong with the welfare state - that it was somehow unnatural and led to results that were contrary to the expectation of "informed" liberal policy makers.
